Second vaccine dose timing

Thank you for your reasoned responses Alegrias1. Appreciate your replies to the posts.

Yesterday there was an admission that the first Pfizer vaccination may only provide 33% protection, rather than 89% claimed, and there has been no research to show the effect of a longer delay between first and second vaccinations.
It seems to me a half-cocked idea that will result in wider infection rates and longer lockdown. Might such low immunity might also trigger more mutations

The point is Alegrias1 that all the tests, research and projections were based on the two dose time frame. Unless you can point to clinically trialled evidence to demonstrate otherwise

I am a great admirer of Joan Bakewell but in this case she is wrong, wrong wrong. How selfish to deprive someone of what may be partial protection at the expense of giving fewer people full protection.

Alegrias1 I thanked you yesterday and I am thanking you again today for all the information you give .... but also for your incredible patience.

Thanks.

Coco51

Yesterday there was an admission that the first Pfizer vaccination may only provide 33% protection, rather than 89% claimed, and there has been no research to show the effect of a longer delay between first and second vaccinations.
It seems to me a half-cocked idea that will result in wider infection rates and longer lockdown. Might such low immunity might also trigger more mutations

But I haven't read anywhere that vaccines (even if they're 100% efficacious) will result in lower infection rates. It worries me that there's so much attention paid to vaccines, when what will really bring infection rates down is an efficient test and trace system and forcing (encouraging nicely?) people to self-isolate. The best that can really be hoped for is that fewer people are hospitalised and the NHS can get back to treating people as usual. The most vulnerable can have some confidence they'll probably be less affected, although they'll still have the same risk of infection, but there will still be people in low risk groups who are infected and will develop long Covid, hopefully in isolated outbreaks, which could be controlled.

As someone else has mentioned up-thread, I don't think Joan Bakewell can be relied on any more. She did indeed go away for the weekend and leave her car engine running.

www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/joan-bakerwell-fined-police-car-running-a4467116.html

Alegrias1 - a voice of reason. You are not alone, but most of us don't have the information to back up anything we write, but I don't remember seeing anywhere that the vaccine was going to completely prevent people getting the virus. I saw somewhere where a woman wrote that she was longing to go out and hug her family two weeks after her first dose! Don't know where she got that from! Anyway thank you for your factual and reasoned posts!

Alegrias1

None of that was rude NotSpaghetti, it is all factual and I know I was shouting, but really. Day after day, unfounded and ill informed comments about non existent "manufacturers' instructions" from people who have no idea how the approvals process works. Laying the blame at the feet of the government when its the recommendation of the scientists as a way of getting us out of this situation as quickly as possible.

I think its wicked and self serving to keep bringing up these ill founded concerns based on half-truths we read in the press, and it could dissuade people with sincere vaccine hesitancy from taking the vaccine, then what kind of mess will we be in?

There have been many posts here with evidence about how the extended dose is the right approach, but all we get is "Well Pfizer didn't support it". Why is no-one pointing out that Pfizer said they have 52% effectiveness but Israel are only seeing 33%? (Becuase their trial base is older probably, if you are interested) The manufacturer's comments are only valid when people think they support their own world view.

And Daisymae - have you got any examples of the Horror that these scientists are showing? Because I have plenty of examples of scientists saying its the right thing to do in our circumstances.

Well said Alegrias

Speaking here from Israel I would say that a sample of over 200,00 people vaccinated as against the 36,000+ from Pfizer's sampling would be a pretty good indication that the second dose, as it was designed by SCIENTISTS, is the accepted dosage. Thankfully I've had both dosages, as will everyone else here. It's not margarine and it shouldn't be spread as if it were. The U.K. scientists appear to be making decisions on the hoof.

Interesting, RoMo. How far apart were your vaccine doses?

I get a lot of stick on here because I come on and say I’m a scientist and for some reason that upsets people. Then I see a ridiculous post like Mooney59 ’s that demonstrates just how little some people know about science and scientists. So many people who have no understanding of the scientific concept of risk.

I feel a bit sorry for the MHRA, JCVI and Messrs Whitty et al, because they may actually change the dosing regime in the future. They may look at new evidence that comes in and say “actually, we’d recommend something else”. Then the baying hordes will accuse them of U-turns and cheating the public and god knows what else. When what they have actually done is tried the best they could to save as many lives as they possibly can.

I blame the press, actually. So many misleading reports in the last few days - diverted vaccines from Yorkshire, deaths in Norway, Israel’s results – all of which are misrepresented, and sometimes actually just made up.

Thank you to everybody who has sent me good wishes, I do appreciate it

Alegrias1, I read your posts about this with interest and am grateful for your input. I am the first person to complain about the press speculation which puts such fear into the community. I also think that the Government won't want to shoot themselves in the foot by giving a single dose of vaccine and missing the opportunity to pull in popularity which translate into votes. However, it is worrying that we have been urged to read the manufacturer's instructions about medication but are now being told to ignore them, no matter what the scientists say.
I am a person who goes blank at scientific stuff; I spent a fair few years as a student replicating experiments which were supposed to prove things but they never did. It tends to make me skeptical although I accept that I might not have been the most careful "scientist".
MissAdventure, far nicer to get someone to rub some cream in.

I have seen scientists explain that it is ok to wait 12 weeks and that giving more people the vaccination is more important. One explained it like building a house. The first dose gives you somewhere to live and the second the final tidying up and decorating. You are fine with the first dose...be thankful that you have had it. You will get the top up in time.

I actually know a nurse who was on the trials and now found out she had 2 doses of the Oxford vaccine 3 weeks apart. She still caught Covid and was very poorly several months later.
It's not a wonder vaccine and doesn't work for everyone

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Aaarrghhh!

static.skaip.org/img/emoticons/180x180/f6fcff/headbang.gif

Sorry, too much.....?

Alegrias1 thank you for these reasoned and researched statements, and your continued patience and persistence! I think that the problem is that scientists and doctors are experts in their fields, but don't know absolutely everything. I would rather believe their educated opinions, though, than someone on Gransnet, Facebook or the DM.

Haha this just made me laugh! The one misspelling identified by Gransnet's spell checker in my last post was .... 'Gransnet!' I was offered 'transnet', 'gannet;' or 'grassnet' !

jillybird Who would bother with two if one was enough?

I don't often resort to capitals but I'm goiing to now, and putr then oin bold for good measure. NO-OPE HAS SAID ONE DOSE OF VACCINE IS ENOUGH
Got it?

No-one even

Sorry about the typos.

The next vaccine which will probably be available sometime in Feb/ March is by Johnson & Johnson, and it is now in phase 3 trials. This will be a game changer because it is based on a one dose regimen. I am involved in the clinical trials at the moment and have had the jab. Here's hoping I got the real thing and not the dummy!

Jillybird

Yes, I'm with Gagajo on this too. Why would the scientists have said the second dose should be within 3 weeks if it could be any old time that's convenient? I won't feel any safer going out after I've had my first dose until I get my second.
Pfizer have issued a disclaimer saying they won't support any claims if their vaccine isn't delivered within the time-frame recommended. Why should they do that? To avoid expensive litigation and financial claims, that's why; so they must suspect that there will be some if the second dose isn't given as recommended, or they wouldn't have bothered with the disclaimer.
Personally, I might have chosen to do the vaccinations in a different order. I think they should have started with clinically vulnerable, then 50+ and moved up in age groups rather than moving down. I appreciate we older ones are most vulnerable, but most of us aren't going to work so can easily take time off at home. (Yes, I'm screaming bored and desperate to see my family, but I don't have to risk going to work and catching the virus - and I don't think there's many on here who do - the majority of us are retired, it would seem).

The reason the scientists said what they did and why the vaccine was licensed for a three week gap is because there was a three week gap in the trials.

They can't guarantee the efficacy after a 12 week gap because they just don't know.

Presumably, Pfizer could now conduct trials with a 12 week gap but that would obviously take at least 12 weeks and I guess the idea was to start getting people vaccinated as soon as possible.